How to Make a Flyer Design for Christmas in Illustrator

Learn how to make a flyer in this event flyer tutorial. You’ll learn how to create an effective flyer design just in time for Christmas.

Whether you’ve been ‘Naughty or Nice’ or even if you’re really not into the whole celebrating the holidays thing, there is one special holiday in December that will make you spread your cheerful spirit, and that day is ‘Ugly Christmas Sweater Day’! Yes, it’s real.

Do you have an ugly sweater lurking in the depths of your closet? Then ‘Ugly Christmas Sweater Day’ is the day to flaunt that colourfully hideous knitwear. The holiday, which started in 2011, is celebrated on the third Friday of December.

To celebrate this festive holiday, today we are going to learn how to create a professional-looking, easy-to-design ‘Ugly Sweater Party’ event flyer, using Adobe Illustrator!

If you don’t have time to design a flyer from scratch or lack inspiration, you can source the latest collection of flyer designs and graphics over at Envato Market or Envato Elements.

What You Will Need

You will need this set of selected fonts in order to complete this project:

Open the Align panel. Select the square and two line segments you just created, and Horizontal & Vertical Align Center, so all elements align equally to one other.

Step 3

Now let’s duplicate the objects to create a checkered pattern.

Select the dashed lines. Use the Eyedropper Tool (I) to apply the same color fill as the square #A01D20.

Then take the Selection Tool (V),select the three objects, and drag the objects horizontally to the right edge, while holding down the Shift–Alt keys to constrain movement. This will duplicate our objects.

Then Select All (Command-A), hold down the Shift–Alt keys, and drag vertically to the top edge of the squares, as shown.

Let’s alter their color.

Take the Direct Selection Tool (A). Select the second and third square and apply a color fill of #EE2532, and for the fourth square #D12027.

Step 4

I realised the first square and its strokes are too dark, so let’s change them to a lighter tone.

Select the first square shape. Select > Same > Fill Color, and change the color fill to #BE2126.

Select All (Command-A).

Go to Object > Pattern > Make. ThePattern Options dialog box will appear, where you can adjust the pattern settings:

Tile Type: Grid

Width: 2 cm

Height: 2 cm

The new pattern will appear instantly in the Swatches panel (Window > Swatches). Now you can delete the shapes we used to create our pattern.

Step 5

Use the new pattern as a fill. Select the Rectangle Tool (M) and draw a rectangle to cover the artboard within the bleed lines.

Object > Transform > Rotate.

Make sure only Transform Patterns is selected, set Rotate Angle to 45°, and click OK.

Step 6

Now let’s add a light frame around our event flyer.

Take the Rectangle Tool (M) again and draw a rectangle of 8 x11.4 cm, with null fill and white Stroke of 1 pt.

Now align the frame to our artboard. Open the Align panel (Window > Align).

3. How to Lay Out and Format Type on the Event Flyer

Step 1

Click the Create New Layer option from the Layers panel, and create three new layers on top of one another, named ‘Graphics’, ‘Type‘, and ‘Top Graphics‘.

Step 2

To promote our party event flyer and create an informative and attractive flyer, we need to include five details :

Greeting or Funny Intro: A short piece of text, placed on top of the flyer in a small font size: ‘Let’s Get Tacky‘ and ‘You’re Invited to The‘.

Title: The main title is ‘Ugly Sweater‘ and secondarily ‘Christmas Party, Live Music Band’. The title needs to be large, readable type, so that the reader knows what we are promoting, and it should be placed in an eye-catching position, contrasting with the background color.

Description: Comes under the title and adds relevant info to the event, like date, time, and location. This year, the holiday happens to fall on December 21st, 2018. ‘21st, Friday, 8PM, December, $20 Entry, Place-Street Address – Doors Open @ 19:45′.

Call-to-action: “RSVP by December 17th – Telephone #.” A call-to-action encourages readers to act now rather than later.

Contact & Address: So the readers can easily contact you. It includes an address, website, telephone number, logo, or social media accounts.

We need to divide our flyer into three sections of visual hierarchy, using Ruler Guides: the top ‘Greeting‘ section (small section), the middle ‘Title‘ section (largest), and ‘Info‘, the bottom section.

View > Rulers > Show Rulers or Command-R. Select the horizontal ruler and drag the guide into the space you want.

Step 3

Make sure you are on the ‘Type‘ layer.

Use the Type Tool (T) to create three text frames, within the designated sections.

Open the Paragraph panel (Window > Type > Paragraph), as well as the Character panel (Window > Type > Character).

Set the Font to Bebas Neue at 14 pt.

Place the text, and Align Center from the Paragraph panel. Don’t worry about the font type or size just yet.

Step 4

Now let’s have some font fun.

When it comes to choosing the right font, there is a lot of trial and error involved to find the fonts that work and suit your design. You need to find a font which matches the flyer design, the message of the event, and the target audience.

Luckily for you, I spared you the time-consuming work and hand-picked a selection of fonts to use on the event flyer design.

Step 2

Open the Stroke panel (Window > Stroke), and set the stroke settings to the following:

Cap: Round Cap

Corner: Round Join

Take the Direct Selection Tool (A) and select all the ‘elbow’ anchor points. This will enable the Live Corners widget to appear next to each corner point. Drag theLive Widgets to round the ‘elbow’ edges.

Then take the Ellipse Tool (L), with white fill, and draw a 0.2 x 0.09 cm ellipse on top of the collar as shown below.

Shift Modes (Shift-D) to Draw Behind from the Tools panel, and use the Rounded Rectangle Tool to draw the white sweater bottom and sleeves.

Use the Rotate Tool (R) to rotate the top sleeve as shown.

Step 3

Let’s add a snowflake to the sweater front.

Shift Modes (Shift-D) to Draw Normal from the Tools panel.

Draw a 1 pt, white stroke line in the center of the sweater. Then use the Pen Tool (P) to draw ‘V’ tips on the top and bottom.

Select the snowflake shapes with the Selection Tool (V). Command-G to Group.

Select the Rotate Tool (R). Hold down the Alt key to duplicate and rotate.

Transform Again (Command-D) to repeat the action, and you’ve got a snowflake!

Step 4

Move on to create sweater 2.

Grab the Selection Tool (V), select all the elements of the first sweater, and hold the Shift-Alt keys to drag and duplicate the sweater.

Delete the snowflake.

Change the color fill of the sweater collar, arms, and body to #00699e. Color the sweater neck, bottom, and sleeves #10375b.

Then, use the Direct Selection Tool (A) to select the anchor points and the Rotate Tool (R) to alter the direction slightly.

Put the sleeves in position, and use the Rectangle Tool (R) to create a 0.13 cm square with color fill #20c3ef.

Object > Transform > Rotate, set Rotate Angle to 45°, and click OK

Hold down the Shift–Alt keys to constrain and duplicate the square as seen below, and position the copies on the sweater.

Step 5

Moving on to the last sweater design, use the Selection Tool (V) to select all elements of the first sweater, and hold the Shift-Alt keys to drag and duplicate the sweater.

Delete everything but the neck and body part. Change the color of the sweater collar and body to #faa722.